Eleven late-April tornadoes spawned in western Nebraska Sandhills, National Weather Service says

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – The National Weather Service of North Platte confirmed eleven tornadoes spawned from a late April event.

On the evening of April 27th, the western Sandhills and Cherry County saw a lot of tornadic activity. That night started out near Bingham and ended near the Merritt Reservoir.

Seven of the 11 tracks can be found below.

Thankfully, limited damage was reported overall.

EF-2 Bingham/Ashby tornado

This was a historic tornado in that it was the widest tornado ever surveyed in the North Platte National Weather Service county warning area. Also, this was only the 7th tornado to exceed a mile in width for the entire state of Nebraska.

Records date back to 1950 and are maintained by the Storm Prediction Center.

NWS North Platte damage survey: “One supercell strengthened as it moved through extreme northeastern Garden County, producing a tornado 5 miles west-southwest of Bingham. This tornado quickly increased in size as it moved northeast, impacting utility poles and trees along Highway 2. Just to the east, the tornado impacted a farmstead and freight train, producing EF-2 damage.

The tornado continued to move slowly to the northeast for the next hour, primarily impacting open country in rural southwest Cherry County. It ended 11 miles north-northeast of Ashby.”

EF-2 Merritt tornado

NWS North Platte damage survey: “Significant damage was found to pine trees. Multiple dead trees were tossed a significant distance.”

There was an apparent satellite tornado to the Merritt tornado, meaning there was likely a smaller tornado revolving around a larger, primary tornado. This would be a second tornado to help the count end up at a total of 11 for this event.

EF-1 Boardman Creek tornado

No additional information was included in the preliminary report by the NWS office in North Platte.

There were also seven EF-U (unknown) tornadoes confirmed to bring the final count up to eleven with no observable damage done:

• EF-U southwest of Bingham, Nebraska tornado
• EF-U north of Hyannis, Nebraska tornado
• EF-U east of Whitman Road tornado
• EF-U North Loup tornado

Not pictured:

• EF-U 6.5 miles WSW of Bingham, Nebraska
• EF-U northeast of Hyannis, Nebraska
• EF-U near Calf Creek

This is a preliminary report from the National Weather Service of North Platte.

Meteorologist Jessica Blum 
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